nathan grayson

17

Nathan Grayson

Kotaku, Writer

Previously: Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Twitter GamerGate Wiki

Corruption

Apparent

Corruption

About

Coverage of the Horizon event, without disclosing his ties to organizer Brandon Boyer — Grayson financed his crowfounded medical treatment and received free admission tickets via GameJournoPros.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 27

Positive coverage of Zoe Quinn in three articles, without disclosing their friendship and eventual affair. Later covered Quinn again, disclosing they "dated briefly", but not that he had previously financially supported her.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 09

Cronyism

Apparent

Cronyism

About

Wrote about Butt Sniffing Pugs without disclosing his personal relationship with Maya Kramer, the game's logistics coordinator.

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Date

2015 Oct 26

Filed

2015 Oct 27

Covered games that were represented by public relations agency TriplePoint in at least eight occasions without disclosing his friendship with Stephanie Palermo, who at the time was working for TriplePoint and involved in said games PR work. After Palermo joined Capcom’s PR department Grayson covered that company and its games four times.

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Date

2014 Apr 08

Filed

2016 Mar 05

Postive coverage of Nina Freeman on two occasions, without disclosing their friendship.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 27

Positive coverage of Gaymer X, with no disclosure of his friendship with its president Toni Rocca.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Mar 29

Positive coverage of White Whale games, with no disclosure of his personal relationship with both members of White Whale.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Mar 29

Positive coverage of Porpentine, without disclosing they worked together at Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 27

Coverage of Riot Games and League of Legends in at least seven articles, without disclosing his relationship with several Riot Games employees, especially Taylor Cocke.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 27

Wrote at least five articles about Mattie Brice, without disclosing their personal relationship, which involves multiple meetups and Grayson getting involved with one of Brice's games.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Nov 25

Positive coverage of his friend Robin Arnott in six articles published through three months.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Mar 29

Cronyism

Possible

Cronyism

About

Wrote two times about Christine Love for Kotaku, partially disclosing a rather apparent personal relationship only in the first. Grayson also wrote a third previous article mentioning Love, but it was published before any public interactions between the two.

Modifier

possible

Date

2017 Jan 05

Filed

2017 Jan 29

Covered Robert Yang in three articles for Kotaku. Grayson disclosed that Yang worked at Rock, Paper, Shotgun (Grayson’s previous outlet) in the first and third article but not in the second. Shortly after the publication of the second article Kotaku’s Editor-in-Chief Stephen Totilo was approached about the lack of disclosure. Totilo replied that Grayson and Yang did not work together and were not close.

Modifier

possible

Date

2015 Jun 04

Filed

2015 Apr 09

Gave positive coverage to Deirdra Kiai in three articles, disclosing their friendship only in one.

Modifier

possible

Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Apr 27

Sensationalism

Apparent

Sensationalism

About

Agenda driven non-interview of Ubisoft’s Mark Thompson, titled “Ubisoft refused to talk to me about women”, spent entirely offering his proofless, subjective prospective on things his subject allegedly didn't say. This piece followed another controversy-chasing article—over a nonissue—by Grayson, who had also previously engaged in a discussed, interrupted interview with Blizzard. By its timing, the Ubisoft interview may have been the cause of Kotaku’s claimed blacklisting.

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Date

2014 Jun 13

Filed

2015 Dec 17

Infamous interview with Blizzard which he concluded by accusing the developer of sexism for the presence of sexy costumes in the game Heroes of the Storm. His questions and preachy followup caused a large amount of controversy and criticism, marking one of the most-often quoted examples of agenda-driven game journalism.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Dec 17

Contributed to the moral panic started by Cara Ellison about a 4-second scene in Hotline Miami 2. Often called a “rape scene”, the scene not only cuts before anything happens, but is immediately shown to be fictional in-universe. His very heavily opinionated interview is credited with escalating this controversy, which may have contributed to instigating Hotline Miami 2’s Australian ban.

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Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Dec 17

Collusion

Not

Collusion

About

Member of GameJournoPros. Not proven to have been active in the list, although there is circumstantial evidence he might have been active.

Modifier

not

Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 Mar 30

Sensationalism

Not

Sensationalism

About

Often accused of plagiarism because one article of his directly copies text from a French one. However, the original plagiarism was by the author of the Imgur post that Grayson quoted as source.

Modifier

not

Date

Not on file

Filed

2015 May 30

GameJournoPros membership isn’t an impropriety by itself. Read why DeepFreeze finds it notable.

This journalist’s career means they might be subject to slight asymmetric scrutiny.

Sensationalism emblems may be based on subjective criteria.

Readers are encouraged to take entries critically, and form their opinion independently.

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